It’s always great to have Blue Foundation releasing new music. While it took two years since they released their last full-length album “Blue Moon”. Now they are giving out a pretty tasty new EP “Brother & Sister”, an extended tracklist provides support for the EP-titled song released two years ago. We asked Tobias Wilner (Blue Foundation founder) to tell our Good because Danish’ readers more about music diversity, collaborations, and last releases. Blue Foundation fans we know you are here! Check out special interview down here.
This six-track body of work is an exclusive material with two “Brother & Sister” remixes, two new instrumental gems and remarkable live performance of a song “Stars Falls Quiet” which make this set worth the listen. It starts with the mix of sounds owe to either American music producers Sonya Kitchell and Shield or Danish project Thousand Years. The tunes they send our way in the style of their previous LP again show why Blue Foundation is in demand for years.
In contrast with the bass-uplifted reworks, we feel smoothed by two new instrumental songs “A Woman Stands On The Stairs in the Shadow” and “Stained / Cut Me Down”. Both songs do not merely fill the overall story but make it massive and sterling. If you don’t get goosebumps yet you’ll probably get them from the last song on the tracklist. It is the record of “Stars Falls Quiet” live performance made at Aarhus Kunsthall. If you ever expected to hear on the same material instrumental songs, radio-friendly remixes and choral parts, we think you should dive into it.
Before launching into a pulsating electronic drop you should take a look at an official music video for the EP-titled single. The video was directed by Colin Kennedy and Dayla Kennedy. Eye-catching pictures of Felix Stec dancing to the Mellisa Schade’s choreography have been assembled by Marc Ritzema. The cinematography displays positive energy flowing around in the world, that’s absolutely what we get from the EP “Brother & Sister”.
GbD Team: Your music has definitely evolved over years. When we try to compare “Bonfires” song (Sweep of Days, 2004) and “Dreams on Fire” (Blood Moon, 2016), I would not even start to think that was the two songs released from the same band. Can you define what pathway the Blue Foundation’s music goes right now?
Blue Foundation: Most of all, the two songs you’re mention seems different because of the different vocalists. We’re known for working with a lot of different vocalists on our albums from Jonas Bjerre (Mew), Kirstine Stubbe Teglbjærg, Findlay Brown, Erika Spring (Au Revoir Simone), Sara Savery to Sonya Kitchell, and then mix it with up with my vocal. Even though our songs have different vocalists, I think there is a matching dreamy eerie sound and vibe to the music we create. If you listen to our song “Watch You Sleeping” featuring Mark Kozelek from our latest album Blood Moon and the duet I have with Jonas Bjerre (Mew) on “Lost Girl” you can hear a homogeneous sound in our production and songwriting even though the 2 songs sounds different. For us, it’s all about trying out new things. Get inspired and swim in uncharted waters. Create something we haven’t done before.
Surely, the stylistic diversity you have presented to date can also be attributed to many collaborations and people who have joined the band before. How does the group look like today? What drive you when either making new collaborations or join new musicians?
Blue Foundation has always been me as the producer and Bo as co-producer. There were a few years at the beginning where my brother was part of the productions, but he left before “Sweep of Days”. So it’s basically me and Bo and the people we want to work with. We choose to work with people because they inspire us and we think they’re cool and talented.
New single “Brother & Sister” released on your last album, “Blood Moon” (2016) tells a universal story about every single boy and girl’s life expectations. Where did the idea for this song come from?
It’s inspired by the kids and good friends I skate with at Brower Park in Crown Heights Brooklyn. These kids are the best. So much energy, dreams, and personalities. They f**king rules!
For years you form one of the most recognizable Danish bands abroad. How do you generate fresh ideas after such a time? You know, people used to say that in pop music “everything has already been written”. On the other hand, electronic music you are making is quite specific in this consideration.
The genre we’re working in, a crossover of electronic music, experimental music, and dream pop, and there’s is not many rules. A song can be everything from 2 minutes to 20 minutes. There are no specific instruments you have to use. If we want to do a 10 minutes long instrumental song only with marimba next to a radio-friendly pop song, we can do that, and no one will ever question that. That’s artistic freedom. To get inspired we listen to a lot of different music. Work with different artists. Basically always searching and trying to learn something new.
We must ask you about current Blue Foundation’s playlist you guys listen to actually. Is there any artist from Denmark that impressed you the most?
I think Iceage is the best rock band from Denmark. I think the Drop the Gun aka. Sara Savery is an amazing singer and songwriter. Love her early stuff with People Press Play. She has been on a few songs on our last two albums. I’m pretty impressed by the beats from Shield and some of the new beatmakers from Copenhagen. AvAvAV is great. Early Sort Sol got a vibe. I don’t know, Efterklang / Lima has always been doing great stuff. Right now I’m listening to Forest Sword, Holy Other, Tim Hecker, GZA, early Wu-Tang Clan, the Fall, and Bach.
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